Tiffany Echoes County's Desire For More Cutting

State Senator Tom Tiffany is supporting Oneida County’s call for increased cutting in the Chequamegon Nicolet National Forest.

Tom Tiffany is calling for bigger timber harvests in the Chequamegon Nicolet National Forest.

Credit US Forest Service

The county board passed a resolution Tuesday asking federal officials and members of Congress to bring the national forest harvest up to its allowable level. Senator Tiffany says after widespread clear-cutting a hundred years ago, the pendulum has now swung too far the other way.

“Now, we have a national forest that’s not being harvested hardly at all, and it’s creating a serious problem where you have too many trees, too much undergrowth in many instances.”

Tiffany blames environmental lawsuits and complicated federal bureaucracy for holding things up. And he says that’s creating an economic problem for the Northwoods.

“We have a mill up in Mercer, where they used to get their hardwood solely from northern Wisconsin and the upper peninsula. And they now import 40 percent of their raw material from Canada. It’s ridiculous that that’s happening, because there’s plenty of hardwood growing in the national forest.”

Tuesday’s Oneida County Board resolution says federal managers are only cutting about half of the 130-million board feet allowed by the national forest plan.

Hours of testimony in Madison whether to allow an exemption to the state's Managed Forest Law that would allow Goegebic Taconite to close up to 4,000 acres by a proposed mine site.

Senator Tom Tiffany's bill that would enable "GT" to deny access on land that otherwise would allow public access. One mining protester was arrested earlier this year at the mine site after a group stopped by to protest. Some damage occured.

In the far reaches of Northern Wisconsin, a remote stand of old growth hemlocks has been cast into the public eye. The 400-acre Van Vliet Hemlocks are known to many as one of the few old growth stands left in Wisconsin. Over the past century forest managers have mostly taken a hands-off approach. But a proposal from the state Department of Natural Resources to log part of the area has community members up in arms.

A chief supporter of a mining project in Iron and Ashland counties is calling on his federal colleagues to investigate Environmental Protection Agency actions in Wisconsin.

State Senator Tom Tiffany of Hazelhurst reacted to a report showing the Odanah wastewater treatment plant has failed to comply with the federal Clean Water Act. The plant serves the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, strong opponents of the proposed Penokee Hills iron ore mine.